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PASTOR GENERAL
1
S REPORT, JUNE 10, 1983
PAGE 13
--Argentina •..will probably need $500 million to $1 billion more
in new loans this year.
--Chile has had to ask banks for
it thought it would need just a
some $900 million in loans and
falling due through next year.
IMF targets.
almost 50% more in new loans than
few months ago when it asked for
a postponement of debt payments
Chile hasn't complied with its
--Mexico is expected to meet its IMF targets for the first two
quarters of this year. But later this year, banks estimate, it
could need another $2 billion.
Finance Minister Jesus Silva
Herzog concedes that the country will get by without new loans
only if everything continues as is. If oil prices fall, or if the
current drought there worsens and agriculture suffers, he says,
Mexico will need more money.
In addition, all these countries will probably need � more
money in 1984. "The question," says Albert Fishlow, professor of
economTcs at the University of California at Berkeley, "is where
is this money going to come from?"... The IMF is running short of
resources, and it has been counting on the u.S. Congress to
quickly approve an $8.4 billion increase in the U.S. contribution
to the IMF's lending resources. But Congress has delayed pas
sage.
"The IMF," says Peter Kenen, an economist at Princeton Univer
sity,...is in a no-win position.
If it is too lenient on a
country that doesn't meet its requirements, other countries have
an incentive not to meet their targets.
!!
it is too tough, it
risks triggering social and political unrest in the debtor
countries.
Thus the "World Debt Crisis II" could put a screeching halt to recent world
wide economic recovery, as well as the natural economic reform plans of Mr.
Reagan and Mrs. Thatcher.
--Gene H. Hogberg, News Bureau